u/iw2050

So for six months from now the date will be by April 10th 2027.

So what’s the evidence? It’s simple really, Trump needs Musk more than Musk needs Trump. If that weren’t the case, why would Trump literally put a medal around his neck after Musk went nuclear on Twitter last year saying he was in the Epstein files?

There’s also the fact that Musk is pouring 12-13 figures into his America PAC (so he’s bankrolling A TON of GOP candidates this year, particularly for Senate). If there’s a blue wave, which there very well could be, Musk will obviously be upset that his donations were of no avail, so that’s gonna start to push things towards another feud.

But the fact is, this has happened several times already. It wasn’t just the one last year, Musk basically recruited Ron DeSantis to primary Trump (remember that glitchy X Spaces launch?) Fool me once, fool me twice, at a certain point something’s going to happen with Musk back in the administration, and it’s going to lead to an unhappy Musk.

Since he really doesn’t need Trump, there’s nothing stopping him from just going all out again and starting another feud.

This is something I just really don’t get, it seems more and more common now that teams will just cycle through different head coaches year to year.

Like I get the Urban Meyer situation, but beyond that, why? Like you don’t see teams moving on from a 1st round QB pick after just one year (usually it’s two or three, in some cases even four).

Like take the Texans, what did they really gain from firing both David Culley and Lovie Smith after one year stints. Or more recently the Raiders, firing McDaniels, Pierce, and Carroll one after the other. Like it’s the ownership paying these contracts, do they just not care about the money?

Like I get that some of the people I mentioned are kinda retreads, but then why hire them at all? Like if you’re a Raiders fan for instance, explain to me why all three firings made sense at the time (as opposed to just giving at least one of them one more year).

To clarify, I worded it in that way specifically because the view I'm referring to is not my belief that the Senate can't abolished (that much is obvious), but specifically that theory behind abolishing it is wrong, regardless of how realistic or unrealistic that goal might be.

My support for keeping the Senate is pretty simple, in the United States, the idea of statehood means something. We're a federalist union of states, not a unitary top-down republic. If we lose that, than we're no longer the United States, and imho it's impossible to recognize the importance of statehood and having pride in your state without having at least one house of Congress where all states can be on a level playing field.

I do support a number of other electoral reforms though; open primaries, RCV, multi-member districts, bringing back the filibuster in the House, requiring a two-thirds majority to appoint new Supreme Court justices, same day congressional primaries nationally, etc. But this idea of "abolishing the Senate" to me doesn't advance our democracy in any meaningful way, especially in such a closely split two party system where the 49% often need protection against the 51%.

To me specifically, abolishing the Senate seems like a quantity over quality move with legislation, i.e. that the idea comes from people who just want a lot of legislation passed, but who care more about passing "stuff" and less about what that stuff actually is.

To get right to it, there's three states in my proposal. Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, roughly along the lines of the 1967 boundaries.

Israel will pretty much maintain its current territorial boundaries. Gaza will be managed by an international taskforce until its rebuilt, at which point it'll begin holding free elections, with the only change being that Hamas and similar affiliates are banned from participating. The West Bank will be a little more complicated, in this proposal it effectively gets the Bosnia treatment. It remains one state, but with two autonomous political entities inside it: the Federation of the West Bank, and the Federation of Judea and Samaria (like how Bosnia has Bosnia proper and Republika Srpska.)

So maybe it could be more accurately described as a "3.5 state solution," but that's my idea in a nutshell. So how do you change my view? Pretty much by either coming up with a better proposal, or by challenging the logistics of a three state solution.

I say the logistics and not the ideology though because the subject of this thread is more about the functional solutions. I'll hear any argument, but I'm also a classical liberal, a supporter of global democracy, and the Western way of life, I'm not going to respond to any of the "err derr genocide, the West is the source of all evil, glory to Russia and China, etc." Unless of course there's a functional solution to follow that theory and not just pure ideology.

EDIT: This was brought up to me in the comments and it's a very important point. I am defining "ideal solution" as the most likely outcome to be stable long term and to provide all of Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza with democratic outcomes.

To define specifically what I mean by chemical vs non-chemical, chemical addictions are addictions that give you withdrawals when you go cold turkey, and almost always stuff that you are physically ingesting (alcohol, nicotine, more illicit drugs, etc.) While non-chemical addictions are usually just habit forming practices (gambling, pornography, doomscrolling, etc.) And side note, I'm not going to respond to anyone saying non-chemical addictions are actually chemical because "they make things happen in your brain," because I've already outlined my definitions.

I think it's incredibly disingenuous to describe both of these categories with the same term (addiction), and also lets people who face the latter do so without taking any responsibility for their actions and just claiming they have a sickness.

If you're hooked on something, say alcohol, and you're really trying to quit, but then come the tremors and the sweating and the actual physical pain, that's something in my view qualifies as an addiction. It goes beyond simply taking agency and deciding not to drink anymore, because there's stuff going on inside your body that makes it incredibly difficult not to continue (especially if we're talking about quoting immediately, and not just weening yourself down, the former can literally kill an addict.)

However, if you find a "gambling addict" or a "porn addict" and you put them in a room alone and isolated for a week, provided they're fed, what do you think will happen in a week? They'll walk out of the room alive and okay, maybe unhappily, but not facing physical repercussions.

The reason I bring this up is because a lot of people like to call these habit forming practices "addictions" so they can just ban them. "That guy gambled away his life savings and his children don't have food anymore, it's not his fault, he's sick! We should ban gambling because he made a bad choice." "You're telling me there's a few kids who don't go outside and just doomscroll on TikTok? Let's ban social media for everyone under 16! It's not your choice to make, it's ours, because you're addicted, the state will do what's best for you."

If people truly just spend all their time gambling, or watching pornos, or doomscrolling, or whatever, they should take agency for their problems, and not just give governments and excuse to implement sweeping bans in response to their own decision to call themselves addicts.

So for the past decade or so, the central argument behind electing Democrats has always boiled down to something like "the alternative's really bad, so vote blue and we'll figure the rest out when we get there." As much as that argument gets criticism these days, it's generally worked in motivating voter turnout. Yes Trump has won two terms, but there's yet to be an election since 2016 where Republicans have won the Presidency and not lost seats in either house of Congress at once.

However, in a post-Trump world, I don't see that argument holding up. I'm not pretending that right wing populism is going anywhere. Honestly, I think we're a decade away minimum from having a non-MAGA GOP nominee (and btw I count Rubio as MAGA, and I say that as a centrist.)

2028 is gonna be one of the ugliest primaries in decades (on either side), the three sides of the Democratic Party all fighting it out with no clear frontrunner. The socialists/progressives will back someone like AOC, the establishment "blue no matter who crew" will back someone like Newsom or Harris, and the New Dems/Blue Dogs will back someone like Shapiro. But inevitably, one of these sides will win, and the other two will lose, and I think the damage done will harm the "big tent" irreparably.

As a centrist "Blue Dog" myself, honestly I don't want to share a party with socialists. People who want to destroy capitalism, who think Israel doesn't have a right to exist, and who stay silent on Ukraine. Beating them in primaries is as important to me as beating MAGA in November. Comparatively, I know socialists largely feel the same way. They don't want Joe Manchin esq figures shooting down there multi-trillion dollar mega bills, they're pretty unlikely to have an American flag on their porch or to say the pledge of allegiance with pride. That's all fine, we're a democracy, to me socialists have just as much a right to participate as any other ideology, but that doesn't mean we should share a party when we're diametrically opposed in our belief systems.

As I see it, either the socialists or the centrists are gonna have to take their ball and go home after 2028, and by go home I mean start a new party. "But that'll never happen, America's always been a two party system!" You're probably thinking... Honestly, I disagree. The Tories and Labour were entrenched in the UK for a century, and now look at them, weak and scattered. We're special as Americans, but we're not that special. If a new party (even a small party with say 10 seats in the House and a few in the Senate) doesn't arise in the next decade, I don't see it ever happening.

So how do you change my view? Well there's a number of ways, I'll list the first ones that are on the top of my head. The first one is convince me that socialists and centrists have a shared interest in remaining in the same party. For instance, take the Israel issue. Centrists view Israel as a beacon of democracy in a sea of autocracy while socialists largely view it as an evil settler colonial state that should be wiped off the map, that seems like complete opposition. Why should two sides with such polar opposite views stay in the same party?

Or better yet, convince me that we're better off in a two party system than a multi party system. As I see it, starting a new party actually isn't that difficult, there just hasn't been a need for one until now. All you need is one person with a ton of money to get ballot access, and a presidential nominee with name recognition, and then two years later you build off that presidential success in the midterms. But maybe you think we're better off with just two parties, if so, convince me.

Or maybe the primary in 2028 won't be as ugly as I expect. Maybe there won't be a complete war in the party, centrists vs establishment vs socialists, and everyone will just kumbaya and join hands behind Newsom or Harris, idk.

So to clarify my view, I am a Pahlavist in the United States (not an Iranian-American though), and what that means is that I believe that the establishment of a pro-Western democratic government in Iran is supported by the Iranian people, and necessary for Western stability and hegemony. I also believe that if democracy in Iran happens, that Reza Pahlavi will have some sort of role in that transition.

I acknowledge that we lost the war, obviously. I think far too many people who want freedom in Iran have put their faith in a President who obviously was and still is working against the interests of the Iranian people in their quest for freedom, as well as working against the interests of the Israelis. I wrote in a Democrat for President in 2024 (since I had zero faith in either nominee on a lot of issues, not just foreign policy.)

For a democratic transition to be possible in Iran, I think one of two things need to happen. The first one is more likely, and it's basically that Israel just needs to go it alone. This is already in the works, the Trump-Vance regime has let Israel down, it's undeniable at this point. They took out all the high level leadership, they're winning in Lebanon, they've won in Syria too, but now Trump and Vance want to blame their failures on someone, so they're sabotaging one of our most important international partnerships.

For Israel to get it done alone, it will take years, but I think it's possible. Israel needs to gradually arm groups on the border with Iran in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Azerbaijan (covertly), groups that can get weapons into Iran to rebel groups on the periphery, who from there can eventually take over the periphery and then work their way into the major cities. It would help if the United States participated, but I believe Israel (and possibly some of the Arab states, covertly too of course), could get it done independently.

As for the second option (i.e. the one where the United States participates), the strategy's basically the same, but we'd need either a reliable Republican elected President (unlikely, I'm not sure even Rubio's useful anymore, good options are few and far between), or a reliable Democrat (more likely, probably someone like Josh Shapiro or Elissa Slotkin.) But Trump isn't the guy who's gonna get it done, whether it's with Ukraine, Israel, or Taiwan, he always in the end is going to be the President who sides against the West, and sabotages our most critical alliances. He's compromised, he's the personification of cowardice, and he cannot be trusted.

But I'm curious what people think on the issue of regime change in Iran, because I'm guessing (but I'm not certain) that most people on this platform probably think it's somewhere between unlikely and impossible (seeing that the failures with the war probably put a bad taste in peoples' mouths.) So if you're of that view, what's your thinking?

Honestly I don't get why anyone's opposed to this idea (beyond the typical anti-immigration talking points), if we allow it for our members of Congress, and our Governors too, why not Presidents?

To get elected to Congress, you need to have been a U.S. citizen for seven years, if that's good enough for our legislature than why not also for our executive branch?

Interestingly though I don't ever see people on the left who in good faith are pro-immigration ever talking about this though. I was very young when Obama's birth certificate controversy came up, but honestly if he was actually born in Kenya, who cares? He was elected to the Senate and then to the Presidency, the people chose him, to me that's enough. We're a democracy, the people are never wrong, and artificial guardrails put in place to limit our choices seem pointless. Same with age limits or term limits even, though that's a separate subject.

More anecdotally, if I could vote for literally anyone for President, Arnold Schwarzenegger would be one of my top choices, I certainly think he'd be better than any of the Presidents that have been elected in my lifetime, or the many candidates those people have beaten too. But I can't vote for him, my choices have been limited by the state with this artificial guardrail.

So how do you change my view? I'll put it this way, if there was a lever I could pull today that immediately got rid of the natural-born citizenship requirement to run for President (and just reduced it to regular citizenship plus seven years), I would pull that lever. Convince me not to.

The premise of this view sums it up simply enough, I believe Democrats can flip four seats and retake the Senate in 2026 without beating Susan Collins.

I believe Platner's controversies combined with Collins' unique level of support among Maine Democrats could be enough to localize a win for Collins regardless of whatever happens around the rest of the country (i.e. even in a blue wave.) I also believe there are more than enough other opportunities for Democrats to retake the Senate without Maine, and here are the following conditions for such a win:

- North Carolina and Alaska are must wins. Roy Cooper and Mary Peltola are S tier candidates in purple states (yes Alaska with RCV and it's cultural libertarianism is purple down ballot imho.)

- Two states among Texas, Montana, Ohio, Nebraska, Florida, and Iowa. That's a ranking in order of likelihood imo btw, from most to least likely. I think Montana in particular is a sleeper state because the Democrat is likely dropping out, and Bodnar is much more centrist than Osborn (which is critical since they're both red state candidates running as de facto Democrats, even if the Independent ballot line might help them out a bit.)

So how do you change my view? Convince me that it's either impossible for Collins to win re-election in this political environment, or that Democrats can't obtain four flips without Maine being one of them. Note, I'm not saying that Democrats are guaranteed to flip four states and that Maine will be one of them, just that it's conceivably possible (and more likely than not imho.)

Tbh though I'm not going to respond to anyone trying to "sell me" on Platner, this is an analytical view, not an ideological one. Also I'm going to disregard any claims of Fetterman not counting as a Democrat, tbh he's not even close to where Manchin was, let's be real Fetterman's a Blue Dog in name only (even if he has no chance of winning re-election in 2028.)

To put it simply, imho if Turkey doesn't get rid of Erdogan in 2028 (or perhaps his chosen successor), it's never gonna happen. It's debatable whether that's even possible in Turkey's current system, they're certainly a hybrid regime as opposed to a free and fair democracy, so it'll be harder to get rid of Erdogan than it was Orbán, but they're not fully authoritarian so I won't call it impossible, I will call it "now or never" though.

If Turkey can't get rid of Erdogan's party in 2028, I honestly just don't think they're worth the trouble. We already sank any chance at a Kurdish state in 2019 by siding with them in Syria, Turkey is also openly pro-Hamas atm when we're in the middle of a regional war in the Middle East, Western politicians often avoid acknowledging the Armenian genocide to avoid offending Turkey, so at a certain point I think we in the West have to ask ourselves if it's even worth it anymore.

After the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East are finished, NATO will undoubtably be expanding. Ukraine, Moldova, the three Caucus states, and Israel are all obvious targets for NATO expansion. However I think if Turkey doesn't get rid of Erdogan's cronies in 2028 that they'll get in the way of all this, so not only are their illiberal tendencies an ethical risk to the alliance, but they could also be a strategic risk.

Change my view though if you disagree. Turkey's often a point of debate in our foreign policy because most Westerners generally agree that a Kurdish state has the right to exist, but also that Turkey has at least some strategic value to NATO. So if you think I'm wrong, why?

Not to get overly anecdotal, but I (21M) am approaching a point in my field of work where within a few years, I will likely be able to work completely remotely, and because of this I've thought a lot about the possibility of moving abroad on a USD salary.

For the record, this is not one of those "Trump is bad so I'm leaving the United States!" rants. I don't care for the guy, but who gets elected President here has zero bearing in my decision to live in the U.S. or abroad. All things considered, I love America, and I think we probably have the best and most reliable system of government on the planet. However, it's expensive to live here, and the power of the dollar is stronger literally everywhere else.

A few ideas have crossed my mind, I've heard a lot about Mexico City as a destination for American expats (and it's becoming popular enough for online workers that there's even small areas of the city now that primarily speak English), South Africa has the lowest net cost of living of any English speaking country so perhaps that could be an option too.

Granted this is all conceptual so take it with a grain of salt, but the broader point is that these are all places I've visited personally and as I contemplate it, if I get to a point where I'm making money remotely I don't think I'd ever have a problem with living abroad, and if it's so much cheaper outside of the country, I suppose why not?

Why not though is the essence of the view. The "me" in this scenario is almost irrelevant, because the concept of being paid in USD remotely while living abroad certainly isn't my idea, there's countless people doing it already. So approaching this more conceptually, talking to any American who is both working remotely and able to live outside of the country, why should they stay? Change my view, why is accepting the higher cost of living in the United States worth it?

To clarify my view a little more before I begin my reasoning, it is my belief that the TSA should be fully abolished, and that although air travel security standards should be set by the FAA, the actual security enforcement should be decentralized and handed off to individual private contractors (as was largely the case before 2001.)

Whether it's overly invasive searches, the high cost to taxpayers (which often results in the TSA not operating properly due to government shutdowns), the appearance of security instead of the actual enforcement of security, or more simply the TSA employees themselves, the TSA as an organization has let our country down, and in my opinion they shouldn't exist.

At this point it's widely accepted that the TSA has done little directly to combat attempted acts of terrorism against our country's airlines, they are the essence of "appearance over action." The TSA is a group of unelected bureaucrats who arbitrarily decide a limit for the size of a toothpaste container we're allowed to fly with, who give their employees carte blanche to do invasive pat downs even when a metal detector finds something that is clearly a zipper, and who take multi-billion dollar amounts of our tax dollars every year to run their inefficient monopolistic fiefdom.

Speaking of monopolies, it's also widely accepted by anyone who understands basic economics that monopolies are inherently inefficient, and the TSA is obviously a monopoly. Aside from the uber-wealthy, if you want to fly in America, you have to be subjected to their inefficiency and incompetency. There's a government shutdown and two hours lines at security now? Too bad, the TSA thinks that September 11th happened because they didn't get to riffle through your personal belongings, not because our intelligence services didn't know what was going on in Afghanistan.

The TSA is a joke, an embarrassment to the nation, and a big ad in the paper from our government saying "we care more about multi-billion dollar theater than your safety and dignity."

The bun, the burger, the cheese, and the bacon, that's all. It's not like I haven't tried burgers with other stuff btw, I have, and I really thing loading up a burger with vegetables just doesn't taste good and is a waste of time. Like what am I, a rabbit? I'm looking to eat meat and carbs, so why insist on wasting my time with a bunch of veg in the middle.

The best burger imho is medium rare with a good pepperjack cheese and some bacon, that's all. Not that I'm totally against a regular cheeseburger, or even more simple just a plain burger. But the description I just gave is what I consider the ceiling of burgers.

So how do you change my view? Simple, convince me to add anything else, literally anything, and you've formally changed my view. I should outline a few exceptions though.

First off, no, I'm not hearing you out on ketchup, if you eat anything with tomato flavored sugar paste, and I mean anything not just burgers, you are a literal child. I'll hear you out on anything else though. Second, when I'm talking about burgers I mean real burgers, so none of these turkey burgers or chicken sandwiches or vegetarian/vegan alternatives (although I do actually like some of those), this is real burger conversation. Also one more thing. Salt, pepper, and butter do not count as "additions," I know that might sound arbitary, but they're fundamental ingredients to food, not "additions" like a vegetable or a condiment or whatever.

That's it, good luck.